Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

Here's a fairly recent video I just ran into and felt that I should share here showing how small animals like guinea pigs are treated in the breeding mills that Petco and Petsmart get their supply from. If you are considering buying an animal from these pet stores or are tempted to 'rescue' them by 'adopting' them you're supporting this cruelty and condemning more animals to this treatment. Please adopt from a rescue or personal ad, don't buy!

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

I don't know if I'd do it again or not, but I love my petsmart girl. I was lucky in that she is healthy. She was totally an impulse buy for a friend for our rescue. Not the best way to go about it, but so far it's working. I swear I just went for hay and food for the rescue, and then I saw her adorable face and had to have her too. This was pre my knowledge about breeders.

I always wonder though, If we stop buying what happens to the pigs in the store. It's a conundrum in my mind.

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

Originally Posted by BFGuru

I don't know if I'd do it again or not, but I love my petsmart girl. I was lucky in that she is healthy. She was totally an impulse buy for a friend for our rescue. Not the best way to go about it, but so far it's working. I swear I just went for hay and food for the rescue, and then I saw her adorable face and had to have her too. This was pre my knowledge about breeders.

I always wonder though, If we stop buying what happens to the pigs in the store. It's a conundrum in my mind.

I too bought my first pigs I owned myself from a pet store and I didn't know better. I do now!

As for your conundrum I think it's more of a theoretical concern rather than a realistic scenario to worry about. I just don't think it will happen where everyone on the planet would suddenly stop buying guinea pigs from pet stores. Instead it would be a more gradual decrease in demand, which decreases the need for supply, which decreases this kind of treatment and breeding of animals. In the scenario where a particular store stops selling animals they would probably just stop buying from the supplier and then sell off the remaining stock and kill any who don't get sold. The supplier would stop breeding as many animals, if any, since they can't make a profit. They might keep the remaining stock or kill them.

The killing element obviously sucks but if the industry continues it will cause more deaths long term than this one scenario and I think the discontinuation scenario is the lesser of two evils. For every one person who doesn't buy a guinea pig at a pet store it is one less demand and one less need for supply. When thousands of people do the same (and thousands of people do) that number of pigs who are not raised in these conditions dwindles. All those thousands of pigs were not born and raised in these awful conditions and those awful people who did this do not see that money for it.

This actually reminds me of something I mentioned on another forum regarding vegetarianism and how what a single person does, does matter. I pulled out some stats for that where one person eats about 7000 animals in their lifetime. There are 7.3 million vegetarians in the US so that's 51.1 billion animals who were never raised and killed, who did not add to excessive water use, environmental destruction, and climate change.

Similarly, there are probably millions of people who adopt rather than buy, the above number gives an indication of what kind of effect it can have when individuals choose to not add to an industry. Every person counts and it all adds up. Pigs will just never get bred as the demand dwindles. There's probably enough accidental litters to continue the species indefinitely. Even so, it's just not realistic to expect the industry to ever die down entirely, at least not in our lifetime. Which is unfortunate but what one person does, still matters. If you don't support these practices, don't give them your money, don't pay these people to abuse animals and voila you will, together with others, prevented thousands of these animals from ever being raised in these kind of conditions.

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

Originally Posted by Fay

I too bought my first pigs I owned myself from a pet store and I didn't know better. I do now!

As for your conundrum I think it's more of a theoretical concern rather than a realistic scenario to worry about. I just don't think it will happen where everyone on the planet would suddenly stop buying guinea pigs from pet stores. Instead it would be a more gradual decrease in demand, which decreases the need for supply, which decreases this kind of treatment and breeding of animals. In the scenario where a particular store stops selling animals they would probably just stop buying from the supplier and then sell off the remaining stock and kill any who don't get sold. The supplier would stop breeding as many animals, if any, since they can't make a profit. They might keep the remaining stock or kill them.

The killing element obviously sucks but if the industry continues it will cause more deaths long term than this one scenario and I think the discontinuation scenario is the lesser of two evils. For every one person who doesn't buy a guinea pig at a pet store it is one less demand and one less need for supply. When thousands of people do the same (and thousands of people do) that number of pigs who are not raised in these conditions dwindles. All those thousands of pigs were not born and raised in these awful conditions and those awful people who did this do not see that money for it.

This actually reminds me of something I mentioned on another forum regarding vegetarianism and how what a single person does, does matter. I pulled out some stats for that where one person eats about 7000 animals in their lifetime. There are 7.3 million vegetarians in the US so that's 51.1 billion animals who were never raised and killed, who did not add to excessive water use, environmental destruction, and climate change.

Similarly, there are probably millions of people who adopt rather than buy, the above number gives an indication of what kind of effect it can have when individuals choose to not add to an industry. Every person counts and it all adds up. Pigs will just never get bred as the demand dwindles. There's probably enough accidental litters to continue the species indefinitely. Even so, it's just not realistic to expect the industry to ever die down entirely, at least not in our lifetime. Which is unfortunate but what one person does, still matters. If you don't support these practices, don't give them your money, don't pay these people to abuse animals and voila you will, together with others, prevented thousands of these animals from ever being raised in these kind of conditions.

One of the best posts I've ever read on this matter on any forum. Well thought out, provides an explanation, and not a single note of superiority. Nicely done, @Fay.

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

That does make sense. I do love my girls. And my calico is kind if like the cat I always wanted but never seemed to get . Always wanted a calico, but mine are all strays and they landed in our laps. Almost got a buff Cali from the SPCA once. She had a heart murmur and I didn't think I could financially handle her healthcare, so we came home with her brother, who was two toned instead .

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

I got Maple from a pet store without knowing any better.
Fortunately, it was a local pet store not being supported by breeders, or anything for that matter. (The owner wanted to get out of the pet business.)
I actually bought Maple and his sister and the same time, not realizing that he was a male. (Hence the kind of girlish name. I couldn't bring myself to rename him.)
We found Buttercup a good new home where she would be loved and cared for, because I couldn't care for two separate guinea pigs, and Maple was the one that I had originally chosen as mine. (I was too scared to get him fixed, which is probably good, because our vet is a "small animal vet.") I still feel guilty.
But Maple was left in need of a friend, and look as I might, the closest guinea pig rescue was three hours away, and my mom wouldn't drive my that far. So I bought Steve from Petco. (Not realizing that Petco had an adoption system.) He seems healthy enough, although he somehow doesn't seem as healthy as Maple. (Maple was also raised in a bad environment, but we got him out of there pretty quickly.
So that is my pet store story. I now understand that there is no excuse for getting a guinea pig from a pet store, but at that point I didn't think to look on Facebook or Craig's list.

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

I work at Petsmart and although supposedly PetSmart cut ties with those people, it totally makes sense that they come from such a place. They're super young, a lot of them get ringworm or get like a flu or some sort. We do take them to the vet but I think they have a budget so they don't do much at the vet. Probably just a physical. The Syrian hamsters, when they send them really young and in a big group, they tend to get wet tail. Wet tail really sucks. It's killed a bunch of our hamsters. Another thing that's happened, with robo hamsters, they randomly die with bloody eyes.

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

Like I'm seriously looking for another job because I literally want to cry all the time. Our bearded dragons keep dying. Also our water dragons too. I think the beardies come with a virus but also our reptile habitats just kinda suck. They tanks are only glass at the front, the rest is plastic. The tops are also plastic and recently the basking lights burned the tops, making it smell terribly like burning plastic.

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

We ordered different tops but they only had other plastic ones available. These are more durable but even though it said for "desert" it caused a lot of humidity so we've just removed the tops. The bearded dragons don't get out but the leopard geckos did. It took us a few days to notice though, idk why and one of them died behind the tanks. It was the saddest thing. He was so big and was comfortable with people and it seemed like he would have a long life but no

Re: Are you thinking of buying an animal from Petco or Petsmart?

I adopted one of my piggies from there though. Since we are a only female store, when they accidentally send us a male, we can't sell them so they're up for adoption. I had just adopted a lone piggie so it worked out. But if I wasn't there,they would just give him to just anyone.
Petsmart doesn't educated their employees very well either. They don't know about cage size minimums or stuff like that. It also seems that no one really does research to learn about the animals. The rest of my coworkers don't seem to think hay is really important because they're running low when I'm not there, or they don't have any at all. It's so annoying